767. Hot Seat - Actor Claire Lovering

Claire Lovering Takes the Hot Seat: Authenticity, Acting, and Life Beyond the Stage!

Ever wondered what makes an actor tick beyond the spotlight? Claire Lovering brings her genuine charm to this episode of Fearlessly Failing Hot Seat, revealing the person behind the performances. From her commitment to giving up fries for an entire year to her refreshingly honest take on career competition, Claire offers a glimpse into her world with humor and heart.

In this rapid-fire conversation, Claire opens up about her favorite cities (spoiler: LA might be winning over Paris), her genuine fear of heights, and why accountability matters so deeply to her. The conversation takes a delightful turn when she shares how her relationship with her actor boyfriend functions as a true partnership rather than a competition—where "his wins feel like my wins."

Timestamps & Key Takeaways:

2:15 - Sweet or savoury? Claire's year-long commitment to avoiding fries
3:30 - Favourite cities and beach spots, including shark encounters at Rottnest Island
5:20 - Confronting her fear of heights, including a stage-jumping incident that led to injury
6:45 - Claire's favourite quality about herself: her sense of humour and making her boyfriend laugh
8:30 - Favourite plays and movies, including "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" and indie picks
10:40 - The supportive dynamic with her actor boyfriend: "We're a team"
12:15 - Advice for young actors: "I'm a human being who acts" - finding identity beyond the craft

Don't miss Claire's powerful perspective on maintaining your humanity in the entertainment industry. Catch her performance in "Play Dirty" on Amazon Prime, and tune in next Wednesday for another Fearlessly Failing Hot Seat episode that dives deep into the real stories behind success!

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to fearlessly Failing hot Seat. In this EPP, I
fire rapid questions at one of our fearlessly failing guests.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
PS. I'm gonna be honest with you.

Speaker 1 (00:11):
I'm not so good at the rapid part. I get
too intrigued by the awesome answers. Now, a new EPP
is going to drop every Wednesday, so enjoy this shortest
style episode of fearlessly Failing Hot Seat.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Welcome to the hot Seat.

Speaker 1 (00:30):
Claire Lovering, great name, by the way, Oh thank you,
it's real.

Speaker 2 (00:34):
It's a goodie.

Speaker 3 (00:35):
Yeah. My dad's called Lindsay Lovering.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Oh that's just lovely.

Speaker 4 (00:38):
And my mum upgraded from Christine Boyles to Christine Lovering,
so she lucked out.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah that's a nice and I'm going to keep it. Yeah. Yeah,
it's such an atter.

Speaker 3 (00:46):
Who I marry?

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Yeah it's such a goody. Okay, my friend, hot seat,
don't feel like you need a rush, but oh yeah, okay?
Sweet or savory? Oh my god, I've never been asked
that savory? Okay, what would the meal be or your lobstroll? Now, man,
it would be like fries.

Speaker 4 (01:05):
But as I told you earlier, I have this year,
my news resolution was no fries or potato chips, and
it's September, so I'm doing it.

Speaker 3 (01:14):
That's amazing.

Speaker 4 (01:15):
That's my favorite, like salty, crunchy, Yeah, fries, cheese like
blue cheese.

Speaker 1 (01:22):
Noise, Yeah, okay. Fave city is it where you're going
in a couple of weeks.

Speaker 3 (01:29):
That's another one? Oh God? Maybe Paris? Yeah, more than
New York. Yeah, I don't love New York. I love
La more than New York.

Speaker 4 (01:37):
I might be in my favorite city right now in La.

Speaker 3 (01:40):
Oh.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
I think you're the second person to say La.

Speaker 4 (01:42):
Yeah, it's not that it's not many people's favorite, but
I do love Paris.

Speaker 1 (01:46):
Okay, I feel like I might be able to guess
this one. Fave nature spot, Oh the beach.

Speaker 4 (01:53):
Yeah, I do love North Bondi beach.

Speaker 3 (01:58):
Yeah, really Beati.

Speaker 4 (02:02):
But also yeah, Freemantle. I grew up by the beach,
so Layton Beach or Rottnest Island.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
I love Rottenest.

Speaker 3 (02:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:08):
Big sharks out there though, big sharks.

Speaker 4 (02:11):
It's funny, like swimming and bonna, you don't think about it,
but in w A you don't. You always sort of
like when you swim, you swim up to your waiste
and you always make sure there's like another person further
always and it's because of sharks.

Speaker 3 (02:20):
Yeah, just crazy.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
I went at Rottenest.

Speaker 1 (02:23):
I was swimming in this little like it was called
Little Salmon Bay or something. Yeah, and I'm just I've
got like goggles on, I'm swimming over and they pulled
everyone out of the water because.

Speaker 3 (02:32):
Of great white Oh my goodness.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
I love sharks.

Speaker 3 (02:36):
I love sharks. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
Do you have a fear.

Speaker 4 (02:40):
I'm really bad with heights, okay, but I'm working on it.
Like I went on a Ferris wheel a couple of
weeks ago. Oh that's a big that's big.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Ferrisheels are actually scary if you think about how long
you dont when you get stuff out that.

Speaker 4 (02:53):
Yeah, but I can't do rides. I don't do roller coasters.
I can't do Matt.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
You would get on well with Matt. Matt can't either.

Speaker 3 (02:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (03:00):
And I had to do a play where I had
to jump off a two point eight meet a platform
and onto a crash.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Matt and I.

Speaker 4 (03:09):
Everyone you had to like jump and land on your back.
And I just every time I would go to jump
on the practice ones, my body would like my legs
would kick out.

Speaker 3 (03:16):
I just couldn't.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
It was like a weird yeah, physical thing where yeah,
did you come good? As the play went on.

Speaker 4 (03:23):
No, right before we opened, I said can I please
do a different jump? And I ended up landing on
my feet, which ended up giving me a bulge disc.

Speaker 3 (03:34):
Oh so that's the story for another time.

Speaker 1 (03:36):
Oh no, okay, what is one of your favorite qualities
about yourself?

Speaker 3 (03:42):
Oh?

Speaker 4 (03:43):
I like making my boyfriend laugh, So I think my
sense of humor.

Speaker 3 (03:48):
It's my favorite thing to make him laugh.

Speaker 4 (03:50):
I mean, I haven't been particularly funny in this I've
been quite serious, but I do think I can be
fun and funny.

Speaker 1 (03:57):
Even when I My favorite is you actually got earlier,
Like when I was like, okay, so we're going to
sit and record this on the couch and you're like, no,
I can't see it.

Speaker 4 (04:04):
I was gonna say something like my knees don't bend
or something, but yeah.

Speaker 1 (04:08):
It nearly got him too, which you normally can't do
that with Matt at all.

Speaker 2 (04:14):
Okay, do you have a pet peeve?

Speaker 1 (04:18):
Yes?

Speaker 4 (04:19):
When people let you down or say they're going to
do something and don't. Yeah, I guess accountability or follow
through that kind of vibe.

Speaker 3 (04:30):
Yeah, does that make sense?

Speaker 1 (04:32):
This is not fair for me to ask this one
to an actor. This one and the next one are hard. Okay,
favorite play?

Speaker 2 (04:39):
Oh so mean, isn't it?

Speaker 3 (04:42):
That's really.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
Or you can say play right if you want to,
like stick to her.

Speaker 4 (04:48):
I love Dennis Kelly, who's an English playwright. He wrote
the book for Matilda the musical. Yeah, I love his writing.
It's really kind of like dry and dark but really funny.
I think probably, like my my favorite play that I've
been in was Who's Afraid of Virginia? Yeah, so I
really yeah, I'd say that one probably.

Speaker 2 (05:09):
And then favorite movie. Sorry, sorry, I know, not fun
Oh my god.

Speaker 4 (05:15):
I think you know when people do letterbox and they
do four. Yeah, sometimes I think about my forward day. Okay,
So there's I love Like Crazy, which has Felicity Jones
in it. It's like a like indie rom com film
from like twenty and eleven. I think I love Melancholia
Las Montrea, which is really great. I love Love actually,

(05:40):
and they're my top three.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
Oh okay, great, Well, now I've got two new newbies
to watch.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
Yeah, there's a fourth I can't remember, but.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, Okay, when you get good news.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
Oh, do you remember your fourth You look like you.
I thought I did, but I don't.

Speaker 4 (05:57):
No. When you get great yes, I did remember another year,
which is a mich Lee film.

Speaker 1 (06:02):
Okay, all right, grace my full pop it on I'll
pop it on them. Yep, appreciate you appreciate Okay, when
you get good news, who's the first person you call?

Speaker 3 (06:10):
My boyfriend?

Speaker 2 (06:11):
Cute?

Speaker 3 (06:12):
And then mom and dad?

Speaker 1 (06:14):
It's cool that you and your boyfriend are both actors,
so he's kind of in it with you and would
understand when you're like, fuck, I haven't heard back, like
understands the game essentially.

Speaker 4 (06:23):
And I've dated actors in the past and it's felt
like competitive. But with him where a team and his
wins feel like my wins and vice versa. So when
he gets a callback or a job, I'm like, yes,
so one of us makes it. Then I don't have
to work. Go like, yeah, I really don't. I mean,
I think i'd care if if I never worked again,
but I just love it if we could. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

(06:44):
one of us is one of us is near enough.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
I think being what you said, being a team is key.

Speaker 4 (06:49):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (06:49):
With your with your partner, I think it's just so important.

Speaker 1 (06:52):
And I know I asked this, and so you can
just be a throwaway little tip. But I just in
case people haven't heard The Monday yet yet. Of course
go back and it's really good, but just advice for
a young actor.

Speaker 4 (07:06):
I gave a lot of sort of practical, practical stuff,
but I would say, have a life outside of acting
and be a human being, be a whole person. When
I started out, I used to be like, I'm an actor,
but now I'm like, I'm a human being who acts.

Speaker 2 (07:22):
That's cool.

Speaker 4 (07:23):
Yeah, So find the other things that make you happy
and fulfill you. And COVID was really good for that
because it made me figure out who I was without
all that. Yeah, and now acting is a thing I do,
but it's not who I am or everything I do.

Speaker 2 (07:39):
I love that. I love that.

Speaker 4 (07:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (07:42):
Okay, well you're unreal to the listener. Go out and
watch Play Dirty.

Speaker 3 (07:48):
Watch it.

Speaker 2 (07:49):
It's on Amazon Prime, yep.

Speaker 1 (07:51):
And you are incredible in it and funny and you
have a great Americana accent, which we love you and
and have so much fun. At the premiere, I'm going
to be cheering you. I want to see all the
content on socials.

Speaker 4 (08:06):
Hopefully my boyfriend can really get some good angles in
portrait mode.

Speaker 1 (08:11):
Yes, have the best time, so proud of you, and
we have to catch up on the flip side.

Speaker 3 (08:17):
Yes, thank you so much, Thank you my friend,